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Thread: Coronavirus (COVID-19) Wuhan Pneumonia

  1. #361
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    Phra Thanakorn

    Thai Buddhist monk claims whiskey helps prevent COVID-19 after being busted for DUI
    A Buddhist monk in Thailand claimed that rice whiskey with lemon prevents Covid-19 after police caught him driving a pickup truck while intoxicated.

    Ryan General

    July 22, 2022



    Phra Thanakorn, 63, is a Buddhist monk from Thailand’s Mueang Loej district who recently got caught driving intoxicated by local police.

    The police officers said they received a report of a monk "causing mayhem" by driving around drunk and asking people for money in the market area.

    When questioned by authorities, Thanakorn admitted to being drunk but said he drank rice whiskey mixed with lemon because he believes it helps prevent COVID-19.

    According to the World Health Organization (WHO), “drinking alcohol does not protect you against COVID-19 and can be dangerous.”

    Thanakorn is set to be kicked out of monkhood for breaking several monastic rules, such as leaving the temple grounds during the rain retreat, asking for money, getting intoxicated and drunk driving.

    A Buddhist monk in Thailand claimed that rice whiskey with lemon prevents COVID-19 after police caught him driving a pickup truck while intoxicated.

    According to local authorities, they received a report that a monk had been “causing mayhem” by driving around and asking people for money in the market area of Thailand’s Mueang Loej district on Wednesday.

    At around 9:30 a.m., officers from the Loei Provincial Police Station found 63-year-old Buddhist monk Phra Thanakorn drunk while sitting inside a bronze-colored pickup truck parked outside the market. The vehicle had the name of a Buddhist temple emblazoned on its door.

    Thanakorn, whose surname was withheld in local reports, was identified as a Buddhist monk from a local temple.

    Upon questioning, Thanakorn admitted that he was drunk, saying that he did two shots of “40 Degrees” rice whiskey mixed with lemons before driving because he believed it helps prevent COVID-19.

    On its website, the World Health Organization called such a belief a myth, warning the public that, “Drinking alcohol does not protect you against COVID-19 and can be dangerous. The harmful use of alcohol increases your risk of health problems.”

    When the police asked him to exit the vehicle, the monk reportedly staggered and tried to talk but was “speaking nonsense.” He also did not have his ID card when the officers asked for it.

    The police confirmed that he was indeed under the influence of alcohol after they breathalyzed him at the police station.

    Thanakorn explained to the officers that he was observing the Buddhist retreat “Pansa” in the Na Din Dam subdistrict, which involves monks staying on temple grounds for three months.

    The monk said that he and two other monks left the temple that morning to seek alms at the market. The other monks with him had already left, leaving Thanakorn to drive by himself as their usual driver had been in an accident.

    Thanakorn’s stunt makes several offenses to monastic rules, including leaving the temple grounds during the rain retreat, asking for money, getting intoxicated and drunk driving.

    Leoi’s Provincial Office of Buddhism will reportedly ask Thanakorn to leave monkhood for good due to his misdemeanors.




    Featured Image via Thairath Online
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    Gene Ching
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  2. #362
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    surge

    Lunar New Year holiday trips surge in China after lifting of Covid restrictions
    By Nectar Gan and CNN's Beijing bureau
    Published 12:15 AM EST, Sun January 29, 2023


    China saw 226 million domestic trips during the Lunar New Year holiday, state media reported, a 74% surge from last year after the government lifted all travel curbs under its now-abandoned zero-Covid policy.

    For the first time in three years, Chinese people were free to travel without the hassle of quarantine or fear of lockdown for the most important holiday of the year, when families reunite in their hometowns to celebrate the new year or go on vacation together.

    The number of trips made inside China during the week-long holiday, which ended on Friday, is the highest since 2020. They include journeys made by all means from flights, trains and cars to boats.

    But the figure still fell far below pre-pandemic levels. In 2019, 421 million domestic trips were made over the holiday.

    The pent-up demand for travel saw China’s tourist hotspots flooded with crowds during the holiday, from the tropical beaches on Hainan island to the ancient villages in the mountainous Yunnan province.

    Overseas travels also skyrocketed after China finally reopened its borders earlier this month. During the Lunar New Year holiday, 2.88 million trips were made across the border, an increase of 120% from last year, according to the National Immigration Administration.

    During the Lunar New Year holiday in 2019, 12.53 million cross-border trips were made, the Xinhua news agency reported.

    The Chinese government abruptly abandoned its costly zero-Covid policy in December, following mass protests against stringent lockdowns and Covid tests.

    The sudden lifting of restrictions saw the virus spread rapidly throughout the country and caught the healthcare system unprepared. Residents were left to scramble for fever medicines and antiviral treatments, while hospitals and crematoriums were overwhelmed.

    With once-ubiquitous Covid testing mostly scrapped, the government stopped reporting the majority of infections, making it difficult to assess the severity and scope of the massive outbreak.

    Amid international criticism over China’s limited release of data, Chinese health authorities in recent weeks published more detailed epidemic information that suggests the outbreak has already peaked.

    On Wednesday, the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said recorded visits to clinics on January 23 had dropped 96.2% from a month earlier, when the peak of cases was reported.

    Only 15,000 people tested positive for Covid via PCR tests on January 23, compared to more than 6.9 million on December 22, according to the CDC report.

    It’s not clear the extent to which the levels of testing have changed during that time – which could affect such figures – or how many people have been infected overall since China moved away from zero-Covid in early December.

    On January 21, the CDC’s top epidemiologist Wu Zunyou estimated that 80% of the country had already been infected.

    The officially reported Covid death toll is also in decline. Between January 20 and 26, China registered 6,364 Covid-related deaths, according to the CDC, about half of the 12,658 deaths reported a week earlier.

    China revised its overly narrow way of counting Covid deaths earlier this month, following mounting criticism over its lack of transparency – including from the World Health Organization. It now includes the deaths of Covid patients who had underlying conditions, instead of only counting fatalities from respiratory failure.

    CNN’s Simone McCarthy contributed to reporting
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    Gene Ching
    Publisher www.KungFuMagazine.com
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  3. #363
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    Pfizer TV AD SPOT 0:30 'Got Booster?' with Martha Stewart

    Gene Ching
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  4. #364
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    Jn.1

    Another covid wave hits U.S. as JN.1 becomes dominant variant
    By Fenit Nirappil and Lena H. Sun
    January 4, 2024 at 6:00 a.m. EST


    A Brooklyn pharmacy advertises coronavirus shots. (Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)

    The United States is in the throes of another covid-19 uptick, cementing a pattern of the virus surging around the holidays as doctors and public health officials brace for greater transmission after Americans return to school and work this week.
    Coronavirus samples detected in wastewater, the best metric for estimating community viral activity, suggests infections could be as rampant as they were last winter. A smattering of health facilities around the country, including every one in Los Angeles County, are requiring masks again. JN.1, the new dominant variant, appears to be especially adept at infecting those who have been vaccinated or previously infected.
    While photos of positive coronavirus tests are once again proliferating across social media, fewer people are going to the hospital than a year ago. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported 29,000 covid hospitalizations in the week before Christmas, the most recent data, compared with 39,000 the previous year. The agency has reported an average of 1,400 weekly deaths since Thanksgiving, less than half of the fatalities at the same point last year.
    Even so, covid remains one of the leading causes of death as well as the top driver of respiratory virus hospitalizations — worsening the strain on hospitals also seeing influxes of flu and RSV cases.
    “Of the three major viruses, it is still the virus putting people in the hospital most and taking their life,” CDC Director Mandy Cohen said in an interview Wednesday.
    Even mild cases can lead to the lasting complications inflicted by long covid.
    When you have covid, here's how to know if you're no longer contagious
    The CDC still recommends people isolate for five days after testing positive, though many Americans have stopped doing so and free tests are harder to come by, making it easier for the virus to keep spreading if people don’t know their cold is actually covid.
    “As with any public health advice, getting people to adhere to policies is always challenging,” said Simbo Ige, commissioner of the Chicago Department of Public Health who is urging residents to follow that guidance. “Appealing to people’s desire to be part of the solution to ending covid or reducing the impact of covid is what we have seen be most effective.”
    Michihiko Goto, an infectious-disease specialist who has seen a modest uptick in covid patients at the Department of Veterans Affairs in Iowa City, worries that the return of college students will seed more infection in the coming weeks.
    The CDC guidance for isolation makes sense, he said, but the reality is that many people do not have the flexibility at work to do so.
    “People without paid sick leave may not be able to [isolate] because they have to feed their families,” he said.
    While coronavirus cases have surged every winter since the pandemic began, the CDC says it is not yet considered a seasonal disease like influenza. The coronavirus fluctuates throughout the year, and the typical winter waves could be influenced by other factors such as holiday travel, cold weather pushing people indoors and the evolution of the virus. The JN.1 variant that is now the most common in the United States has significantly more mutations than its predecessors, which could explain why people who had dodged infections during the summer surge are getting sick.
    “If you look at the different peaks in cases since the beginning of the pandemic, every one of them coincided with the emergence of a new variant,” said Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota. “Too many people are attributing this to seasonality.”
    Few Americans are staying up to date on their coronavirus vaccines to train their immune systems to keep up with an evolving virus. According to CDC estimates, just 19 percent of Americans have received the latest version of the vaccine that lab experiments show offer better protection against the JN.1 variant than the previous formula.
    “That’s not doing enough to suppress the virus from evolving, getting stronger and more evasive,” said Jessica Malaty Rivera, an epidemiologist and senior science communication adviser at the de Beaumont Foundation, a public health organization.
    Stay vigilant & Be Well
    Gene Ching
    Publisher www.KungFuMagazine.com
    Author of Shaolin Trips
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